01 October 2022

A View Of Oaks Amusement Park

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We have our very own old-school amusement park here in Portland, on the river, in the southeast part of town; The Oaks. 

Oaks Amusement Park. 


This is the view from the Sellwood Boulevard bluff. That's real Portland history there, a modestly-sized amusement park that has existed for more than 100 years.

As you can see from this elevated view, it's not one of those spectacle parks. It doesn't have a huge, vomit-inducing roller coaster, no monsters of special effects. just a modest carnival midway and a lovely river-side location. 

There's also a world-famous roller-rink, which, along with the park itself, has survived ten decades of ups, downs, and hundred-year floods


The last time I saw it on TV was in an episode of Leverage which was set in the 1940s and featured a plot on the violent racism of the times. That show, I tell you, was a gem.

This is one of the most Portland things there is, and it's a little hard to find (though the tagline I remember hearing on KEX radio growing up, "at the east end of the Sellwood Bridge!" goes a long way toward helping anyone find it.

It's good for a midway stroll if you're not into rides, and there's all the good-bad midway food. 

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